The first EPCOT festival of 2025 has officially started.

From today, January 17th, until February 24th, 2025, you can check out the EPCOT International Festival of the Arts. This festival is only around for a little over a month, and there is so much to see and do. We are here on the first day to try all the colorful food and see some art. Let’s take a look at how the crowds are during the first day of this popular festival.
Although we send our team out to cover festivals on their first day, we usually recommend waiting to visit until after the first weekend, as EPCOT tends to be crowded at the start and end of each festival’s run.

In the morning, anticipation was high, and we were joined by lots of fellow parkgoers for the opening day of the festival!

The food booths do not typically open when the park opens, so many people were ready to check out the festival’s merchandise at Creations Shop. The line to see the merchandise wrapped outside along the building.

Once you got inside the Creations Shop, it was crowded but not super crazy. Crowds for merchandise will likely thin throughout the day, so you can always stop by later to check out the merchandise.

As we made our way to the World Showcase, we also came across some crowds. The artist booth by the Morocco Pavilion was definitely popular!

When we made it over to the Funnel Cake stand, we were pleasantly surprised to be one of the only ones in line!

However, we have a feeling that the lines for the food booths will start to get longer as we get closer to lunchtime. We will be covering everything there is to see and do at this year’s Festival of the Arts, so make sure to stay tuned to AllEars!
My visit is during the last days of the festival so I’m worried the crowd levels will be the same as opening day or worse. I’d love to see a “perfect day” video in a epcot festival day where they try to do every ride and every booth or festival activity. I’d love to see how the strategy changes and it would be increadibily helpful. Thank you All Ears team for all you do.